AN 


ORATION, 


DELIVERED   BEFORE    THE 


PHI    BETA    KAPPA   SOCIETY, 


AT  CAMBRIDGE,  AUGUST  31,  1837. 


BY 
RALPH    WALDO   EMERSON. 


SECOND  EDITION. 


BOSTON: 

JAMES   MUNROE  AND  COMPANY, 

1838. 


LOAN  STACK 


CAMBRIDGE: 

FOLSOM,     WELLS,    AND     THURSTON, 
PRINTERS   TO  THE   UNIVERSITY. 


ORATION. 


MR.  PRESIDENT  AND  GENTLEMEN, 

I  GREET  you  on  the  re-commencement  of  our 
literary  year.  Our  anniversary  is  one  of  hope, 
and,  perhaps,  not  enough  of  labor.  We  do  not 
meet  for  games  of  strength  or  skill,  for  the  reci 
tation  of  histories,  tragedies,  and  odes,  like  the 
ancient  Greeks ;  for  parliaments  of  love  and  po 
esy,  like  the  Troubadours ;  nor  for  the  advance 
ment  of  science,  like  our  cotemporaries  in  the 
British  and  European  capitals.  Thus  far,  our 
holiday  has  been  simply  a  friendly  sign  of  the 
survival  of  the  love  of  letters  amongst  a  people 
too  busy  to  give  to  letters  any  more.  As  such, 
it  is  precious  as  the  sign  of  an  indestructible  in 
stinct.  Perhaps  the  time  is  already  come,  when 
it  ought  to  be,  and  will  be,  something  else ;  when 
the  sluggard  intellect  of  this  continent  will  look 
from  under  its  iron  lids,  and  fill  the  postponed 
expectation  of  the  world  with  something  better 
than  the  exertions  of  mechanical  skill.  Our  day 
of  dependence,  our  long  apprenticeship  to  the 
learning  of  other  lands,  draws  to  a  close.  The 
millions,  that  around  us  are  rushing  into  life,  can- 

153 


4 


not  always  be  fed  on  the  sere  remains  of  foreign 
harvests.  Events,  actions  arise,  that  must  be 
sung,  that  will  sing  themselves.  Who  can  doubt, 
that  poetry  will  revive  and  lead  in  a  new  age, 
as  the  star  in  the  constellation  Harp,  which  now 
flames  in  our  zenith,  astronomers  announce,  shall 
one  day  be  the  pole-star  for  a  thousand  years  ? 

In  the  light  of  this  hope,  I  accept  the  topic 
which  not  only  usage,  but  the  nature  of  our  as 
sociation,  seem  to  prescribe  to  this  day,  —  the 
AMERICAN  SCHOLAR.  Year  by  year,  we  come  up 
hither  to  read  one  more  chapter  of  his  biography. 
Let  us  inquire  what  new  lights,  new  events  and 
more  days  have  thrown  on  his  character,  his  du 
ties,  and  his  hopes. 

It  is  one  of  those  fables,  which,  out  of  an  un 
known  antiquity,  convey  an  unlooked-for  wisdom, 
that  the  gods,  in  the  beginning,  divided  Man  into 
men,  that  he  might  be  more  helpful  to  himself  ; 
just  as  the  hand  was  divided  into  fingers,  the 
better  to  answer  its  end. 

The  old  fable  covers  a  doctrine  ever  new  and 
sublime ;  that  there  is  One  Man,  —  present  to 
all  particular  men  only  partially,  or  through  one 
faculty ;  and  that  you  must  take  the  whole  so 
ciety  to  find  the  whole  man.  Man  is  not  a  farm 
er,  or  a  professor,  or  an  engineer,  but  he  is  all. 
Man  is  priest,  and  scholar,  and  statesman,  and 
producer,  and  soldier.  In  the  divided  or  social 
state,  these  functions  are  parcelled  out  to  indi 
viduals,  each  of  whom  aims  to  do  his  stint  of 
the  joint  work,  whilst  each  other  performs  his. 


The  fable  implies,  that  the  individual,  to  possess 
himself,  must  sometimes  return  from  his  own 
labor  to  embrace  all  the  other  laborers.  But 
unfortunately,  this  original  unit,  this  fountain  of 
power,  has  been  so  distributed  to  multitudes,  has 
been  so  minutely  subdivided  and  peddled  out, 
that  it  is  spilled  into  drops,  and  cannot  be  gather 
ed.  The  state  of  society  is  one  in  which  the 
members  have  suffered  amputation  from  the  trunk, 
and  strut  about  so  many  walking  monsters,  —  a 
good  finger,  a  neck,  a  stomach,  an  elbow,  but 
never  a  man. 

Man  is  thus  metamorphosed  into  a  thing,  into 
many  things.  The  planter,  who  is  Man  sent  out 
into  the  field  to  gather  food,  is  seldom  cheered 
by  any  idea  of  the  true  dignity  of  his  ministry. 
He  sees  his  bushel  and  his  cart,  and  nothing  be 
yond,  and  sinks  into  the  farmer,  instead  of  Man 
on  the  farm.  The  tradesman  scarcely  ever  gives 
an  ideal  worth  to  his  work,  but  is  ridden  by  the 
routine  of  his  craft,  and  the  soul  is  subject  to  dol 
lars.  The  priest  becomes  a  form ;  the  attorney, 
a  statute-book ;  the  mechanic,  a  machine  ;  the  sail 
or,  a  rope  of  a  ship. 

In  this  distribution  of  functions,  the  scholar  is 
the  delegated  intellect.  In  the  right  state,  he 
is,  Man  Thinking.  In  the  degenerate  state,  when 
the  victim  of  society,  he  tends  to  become  a  mere 
thinker,  or,  still  worse,  the  parrot  of  other  men's 
thinking. 

In  this  view  of  him,  as  Man  Thinking,  the 
whole  theory  of  his  office  is  contained.  Him  na- 


ture  solicits  with  all  her  placid,  all  her  monitory 
pictures.  Him  the  past  instructs.  Him  the  fu 
ture  invites.  Is  not,  indeed,  every  man  a  stu 
dent,  and  do  not  all  things  exist  for  the  student's 
behoof?  And,  finally,  is  not  the  true  scholar  the 
only  true  master  ?  But,  as  the  old  oracle  said, 
"  All  things  have  two  handles.  Beware  of  the 
wrong  one."  In  life,  too  often,  the  scholar  errs 
with  mankind  and  forfeits  his  privilege.  Let  us 
see  him  in  his  school,  and  consider  him  in  refer 
ence  to  the  main  influences  he  receives. 

I.  The  first  in  time  and  the  first  in  importance 
of  the  influences  upon  the  mind  is  that  of  nature. 
Every  day,  the  sun ;  and,  after  sunset,  night  and 
her  stars.  Ever  the  winds  blow ;  ever  the  grass 
grows.  Every  day,  men  and  women,  conversing, 
beholding  and  beholden.  The  scholar  must  needs 
stand  wistful  and  admiring  before  this  great  spec 
tacle.  He  must  settle  its  value  in  his  mind. 
What  is  nature  to  him  ?  There  is  never  a  be 
ginning,  there  is  never  an  end,  to  the  inexplica 
ble  continuity  of  this  web  of  God,  but  always 
circular  power  returning  into  itself.  Therein  it 
resembles  his  own  spirit,  whose  beginning,  whose 
ending,  he  never  can  find,  —  so  entire,  so  bound 
less.  Far,  too,  as  her  splendors  shine,  system  on 
system  shooting  like  rays,  upward,  downward, 
without  centre,  without  circumference,  —  in  the 
mass  arid  in  the  particle,  nature  hastens  to  render 
account  of  herself  to  the  mind.  Classification 
begins.  To  the  young  mind,  every  thing  is  indi- 


vidual,  stands  by  itself.  By  and  by,  it  finds  how 
to  join  two  things,  and  see  in  them  one  nature ; 
then  three,  then  three  thousand  ;  and  so,  tyran 
nized  over  by  its  own  unifying  instinct,  it  goes 
on  tying  things  together,  diminishing  anomalies, 
discovering  roots  running  under  ground,  whereby 
contrary  and  remote  things  cohere,  and  flower  out 
from  one  stem.  It  presently  learns,  that,  since 
the  dawn  of  history,  there  has  been  a  constant 
accumulation  and  classifying  of  facts.  But  what 
is  classification  but  the  perceiving  that  these  ob 
jects  are  not  chaotic,  and  are  not  foreign,  but 
have  a  law  which  is  also  a  law  of  the  human 
mind  ?  The  astronomer  discovers  that  geometry, 
a  pure  abstraction  of  the  human  mind,  is  the 
measure  of  planetary  motion.  The  chemist  finds 
proportions  and  intelligible  method  throughout 
matter ;  and  science  is  nothing  but  the  finding 
of  analogy,  identity,  in  the  most  remote  parts. 
The  ambitious  soul  sits  down  before  each  refrac 
tory  fact ;  one  after  another,  reduces  all  strange 
constitutions,  all  new  powers,  to  their  class  and 
their  law,  and  goes  on  for  ever  to  animate  the 
last  fibre  of  organization,  the  outskirts  of  nature, 
by  insight. 

Thus  to  him,  to  this  school-boy  under  the  bend 
ing  dome  of  day,  is  suggested,  that  he  and  it 
proceed  from  one  root ;  one  is  leaf  and  one  is 
flower ;  relation,  sympathy,  stirring  in  every  vein. 
And  what  is  that  Root  ?  Is  not  that  the  soul  of 
his  soul  ?  —  A  thought  too  bold,  —  a  dream  too 
wild.  Yet  when  this  spiritual  light  shall  have 


revealed  the  law  of  more  earthly  natures,  —  when 
he  has  learned  to  worship  the  soul,  and  to  see 
that  the  natural  philosophy  that  now  is,  is  only 
the  first  gropings  of  its  gigantic  hand,  he  shall 
look  forward  to  an  ever  expanding  knowledge  as 
to  a  becoming  creator.  He  shall  see,  that  nature 
is  the  opposite  of  the  soul,  answering  to  it  part 
for  part.  One  is  seal,  and  one  is  print.  Its  beau 
ty  is  the  beauty  of  his  own  mind.  Its  laws  are 
the  laws  of  his  own  mind.  Nature  then  becomes 
to  him  the  measure  of  his  attainments.  So  much 
of  nature  as  he  is  ignorant  of,  so  much  of  his 
own  mind  does  he  not  yet  possess.  And,  in  fine, 
the  ancient  precept,  "  Know  thyself,"  and  the 
modern  precept,  "  Study  nature,"  become  at  last 
one  maxim. 

II.  The  next  great  influence  into  the  spirit  of 
the  scholar,  is,  the  mind  of  the  Past,  —  in  what 
ever  form,  whether  of  literature,  of  art,  of  insti 
tutions,  that  mind  is  inscribed.  Books  are  the 
best  type  of  the  influence  of  the  past,  and  per 
haps  we  shall  get  at  the  truth,  —  learn  the  amount 
of  this  influence  more  conveniently,  —  by  consid 
ering  their  value  alone. 

The  theory  of  books  is  noble.  The  scholar  of 
the  first  age  received  into  him  the  world  around  ; 
brooded  thereon;  gave  it  the  new  arrangement  of 
his  own  mind,  and  uttered  it  again.  It  came  into 
him,  —  life;  it  went  out  from  him,  —  truth.  It 
came  to  him,  —  short-lived  actions ;  it  went  out 
from  him,  —  immortal  thoughts.  It  came  to  him, 


— business;  it  went  from  him, — poetry.  It  was, 
—  dead  fact ;  now,  it  is  quick  thought.  It  can 
stand,  and  it  can  go.  It  now  endures,  it  now 
flies,  it  now  inspires.  Precisely  in  proportion  to 
the  depth  of  mind  from  which  it  issued,  so  high 
does  it  soar,  so  long  does  it  sing* 

Or,  I  might  say,  it  depends  on  how  far  the 
process  had  gone,  of  transmuting  life  into  truth. 
In  proportion  to  the  completeness  of  the  distil 
lation,  so  will  the  purity  and  imperishableness  of 
the  product  be.  But  none  is  quite  perfect.  As 
no  air-pump  can  by  any  means  make  a  perfect 
vacuum,  so  neither  can  any  artist  entirely  exclude 
the  conventional,  the  local,  the  perishable  from 
his  book,  or  write  a  book  of  pure  thought,  that 
shall  be  as  efficient,  in  all  respects,  to  a  remote 
posterity,  as  to  cotemporaries,  or  rather  to  the 
second  age.  Each  age,  it  is  found,  must  write 
its  own  books ;  or  rather,  each  generation  for  the 
next  succeeding.  The  books  of  an  older  period 
will  not  fit  this. 

Yet  hence  arises  a  grave  mischief.  The  sa- 
credness  which  attaches  to  the  act  of  creation,  — 
the  act  of  thought,  —  is  instantly  transferred  to 
the  record.  The  poet  chanting,  was  felt  to  be 
a  divine  man.  Henceforth  the  chant  is  divine 
also.  The  writer  was  a  just  and  wise  spirit. 
Henceforward  it  is  settled,  the  book  is  perfect; 
as  love  of  the  hero  corrupts  into  worship  of  his 
statue.  Instantly,  the  book  becomes  noxious. 
The  guide  is  a  tyrant.  We  sought  a  brother, 
and  lo,  a  governor.  The  sluggish  and  perverted 


10 


mind  of  the  multitude,  always  slow  to  open  to 
the  incursions  of  Reason,  having  once  so  opened, 
having  once  received  this  book,  stands  upon  it, 
and  makes  an  outcry,  if  it  is  disparaged.  Col 
leges  are  built  on  it.  Books  are  written  on  it 
by  thinkers,  not  by  Man  Thinking ;  by  men  of 
talent,  that  is,  who  start  wrong,  who  set  out 
from  accepted  dogmas,  not  from  their  own  sight 
of  principles.  Meek  young  men  grow  up  in  li 
braries,  believing  it  their  duty  to  accept  the  views, 
which  Cicero,  which  Locke,  which  Bacon,  have 
given,  forgetful  that  Cicero,  Locke,  and  Bacon 
were  only  young  men  in  libraries  when  they 
wrote  these  books. 

Hence,  instead  of  Man  Thinking,  we  have  the 
bookworm.  Hence,  the  book-learned  class,  who 
value  books,  as  such ;  not  as  related  to  nature 
and  the  human  constitution,  but  as  making  a  sort 
of  Third  Estate  with  the  world  and  the  soul. 
Hence,  the  restorers  of  readings,  the  emendators, 
the  bibliomaniacs  of  all  degrees. 

This  is  bad ;  this  is  worse  than  it  seems. 
Books  are  the  best  of  things,  well  used ;  abused, 
among  the  worst.  What  is  the  right  use  ?  What 
is  the  one  end,  which  all  means  go  to  effect  ? 
They  are  for  nothing  but  to  inspire.  I  had  bet 
ter  never  see  a  book  than  to  be  warped  by  its 
attraction  clean  out  of  my  own  orbit,  and  made 
a  satellite  instead  of  a  system.  The  one  thing 
in  the  world  of  value,  is,  the  active  soul,  —  the 
soul,  free,  sovereign,  active.  This  every  man  is 
entitled  to ;  this  every  man  contains  within  him, 


11 


although,  in  almost  all  men,  obstructed,  and  as 
yet  unborn.  The  soul  active  sees  absolute  truth; 
and  utters  truth,  or  creates.  In  this  action,  it  is 
genius  ;  not  the  privilege  of  here  and  there  a 
favorite,  but  the  sound  estate  of  every  man.  In 
its  essence,  it  is  progressive.  The  book,  the 
college,  the  school  of  art,  the  institution  of  any 
kind,  stop  with  some  past  utterance  of  genius. 
This  is  good,  say  they,  —  let  us  hold  by  this. 
They  pin  me  down.  They  look  backward  and 
not  forward.  But  genius  always  looks  forward. 
The  eyes  of  man  are  set  in  his  forehead,  not 
in  his  hindhead.  Man  hopes.  Genius  creates. 
To  create,  —  to  create,  —  is  the  proof  of  a  divine 
presence.  Whatever  talents  may  be,  if  the  man 
create  not,  the  pure  efflux  of  the  Deity  is  not 
his ;  —  cinders  and  smoke  there  may  be,  but  not 
yet  flame.  There  are  creative  manners,  there  are 
creative  actions,  and  creative  words ;  manners, 
actions,  words,  that  is,  indicative  of  no  custom 
or  authority,  but  springing  spontaneous  from  the 
mind's  own  sense  of  good  and  fair. 

On  the  other  part,  instead  of  being  its  own 
seer,  let  it  receive  always  from  another  mind  its 
truth,  though  it  were  in  torrents  of  light,  with 
out  periods  of  solitude,  inquest,  and  self-recovery, 
and  a  fatal  disservice  is  done.  Genius  is  al 
ways  sufficiently  the  enemy  of  genius  by  over- 
influence.  The  literature  of  every  nation  bear 
me  witness.  The  English  dramatic  poets  have 
Shakspearized  now  for  two  hundred  years. 

Undoubtedly   there    is   a   right    way  of    read- 


12 


ing,  so  it  be  sternly  subordinated.  Man  Thinking 
must  not  be  subdued  by  his  instruments.  Books 
are  for  the  scholar's  idle  times.  When  he  can 
read  God  directly,  the  hour  is  too  precious  to  be 
wasted  in  other  men's  transcripts  of  their  read 
ings.  But  when  the  intervals  of  darkness  come, 
as  come  they  must, —  when  the  soul  seeth  not, 
when  the  sun  is  hid,  and  the  stars  withdraw  their 
shining,  —  we  repair  to  the  lamps  which  were 
kindled  by  their  ray,  to  guide  our  steps  to  the 
East  again,  where  the  dawn  is.  We  hear,  that 
we  may  speak.  The  Arabian  proverb  says,  "  A 
fig  tree,  looking  on  a  fig  tree,  becometh  fruitful." 
It  is  remarkable,  the  character  of  the  pleasure 
we  derive  from  the  best  books.  They  impress 
us  ever  with  the  conviction,  that  one  nature  wrote 
and  the  same  reads.  We  read  the  verses  of  one 
of  the  great  English  poets,  of  Chaucer,  of  Mar- 
veil,  of  Dryden,  with  the  most  modern  joy,  — 
with  a  pleasure,  I  mean,  which  is  in  great  part 
caused  by  the  abstraction  of  all  time  from  their 
verses.  There  is  some  awe  mixed  with  the  joy 
of  our  surprise,  when  this  poet,  who  lived  in 
some  past  world,  two  or  three  hundred  years  ago, 
says  that  which  lies  close  to  my  own  soul,  that 
wrhich  I  also  had  wellnigh  thought  and  said. 
But  for  the  evidence  thence  afforded  to  the  phi 
losophical  doctrine  of  the  identity  of  all  minds, 
we  should  suppose  some  preestablished  harmony, 
some  foresight  of  souls  that  were  to  be,  and 
some  preparation  of  stores  for  their  future  wants, 
like  the  fact  observed  in  insects,  who  lay  up  food 


13 

before  death  for  the  young  grub  they  shall  never 
see. 

I  would  not  be  hurried  by  any  love  of  system, 
by  any  exaggeration  of  instincts,  to  underrate  the 
Book.  We  all  know,  that,  as  the  human  body 
can  be  nourished  on  any  food,  though  it  were 
boiled  grass  and  the  broth  of  shoes,  so  the  hu 
man  mind  can  be  fed  by  any  knowledge.  And 
great  and  heroic  men  have  existed,  who  had  al 
most  no  other  information  than  by  the  printed 
page.  I  only  would  say,  that  it  needs  a  strong 
head  to  bear  that  diet.  One  must  be  an  inven 
tor  to  read  well.  As  the  proverb  says,  "  He  that 
would  bring  home  the  wealth  of  the  Indies,  must 
carry  out  the  wealth  of  the  Indies."  There  is 
then  creative  reading  as  well  as  creative  writing. 
When  the  mind  is  braced  by  labor  and  invention, 
the  page  of  whatever  book  we  read  becomes 
luminous  with  manifold  allusion.  Every  sen 
tence  is  doubly  significant,  and  the  sense  of  our 
author  is  as  broad  as  the  world.  We  then  see, 
what  is  always  true,  that,  as  the  seer's  hour  of 
vision  is  short  and  rare  among  heavy  days  and 
months,  so  is  its  record,  perchance,  the  least  part 
of  his  volume.  The  discerning  will  read,  in  his 
Plato  or  Shakspeare,  only  that  least  part,  —  only 
the  authentic  utterances  of  the  oracle,  —  and  all 
the  rest  he  rejects,  were  it  never  so  many  times 
Plato's  and  Shakspeare's. 

Of  course,  there  is  a  portion  of  reading  quite 
indispensable  to  a  wise  man.  History  and  exact 
science  he  must  learn  by  laborious  reading.  Col- 


14 


leges,  in  like  manner,  have  their  indispensable 
office,  —  to  teach  elements.  But  they  can  only 
highly  serve  us,  when  they  aim  not  to  drill,  but 
to  create  ;  when  they  gather  from  far  every  ray 
of  various  genius  to  their  hospitable  halls,  and, 
by  the  concentrated  fires,  set  the  hearts  of  their 
youth  on  flame.  Thought  and  knowledge  are 
natures  in  which  apparatus  and  pretension  avail 
nothing.  Gowns,  and  pecuniary  foundations, 
though  of  towns  of  gold,  can  never  countervail 
the  least  sentence  or  syllable  of  wit.  Forget 
this,  and  our  American  colleges  will  recede  in 
their  public  importance,  whilst  they  grow  richer 
every  year. 

III.  There  goes  in  the  world  a  notion,  that 
the  scholar  should  be  a  recluse,  a  valetudina 
rian,  —  as  unfit  for  any  handiwork  or  public  la 
bor,  as  a  penknife  for  an  axe.  The  so-called 
*  practical  men '  sneer  at  speculative  men,  as  if, 
because  they  speculate  or  see,  they  could  do 
nothing.  I  have  heard  it  said  that  the  clergy, 
—  who  are  always,  more  universally  than  any 
other  class,  the  scholars  of  their  day,  —  are  ad 
dressed  as  women;  that  the  rough,  spontaneous 
conversation  of  men  they  do  not  hear,  but  only 
a  mincing  and  diluted  speech.  They  are  often 
virtually  disfranchised  ;  and,  indeed,  there  are  ad 
vocates  for  their  celibacy.  As  far  as  this  is  true 
of  the  studious  classes,  it  is  not  just  and  wise. 
Action  is  with  the  scholar  subordinate,  but  it 
is  essential.  Without  it,  he  is  not  yet  man. 


15 


Without  it,  thought  can  never  ripen  into  truth. 
Whilst  the  world  hangs  before  the  eye  as  a  cloud 
of  beauty,  we  cannot  even  see  its  beauty.  In 
action  is  cowardice,  but  there  can  be  no  scholar 
without  the  heroic  mind.  The  preamble  of 
thought,  the  transition  through  which  it  passes 
from  the  unconscious  to  the  conscious,  is  action. 
Only  so  much  do  I  know,  as  I  have  lived.  In 
stantly  we  know  whose  words  are  loaded  with 
life,  and  whose  not. 

The  world,  —  this  shadow  of  the  soul,  or  other 
me,  lies  wide  around.  Its  attractions  are  the 
keys  which  unlock  my  thoughts  and  make  me 
acquainted  with  myself.  I  launch  eagerly  into 
this  resounding  tumult.  I  grasp  the  hands  of 
those  next  me,  and  take  my  place  in  the  ring 
to  suffer  and  to  work,  taught  by  an  instinct,  that 
so  shall  the  dumb  abyss  be  vocal  with  speech.  I 
pierce  its  order ;  I  dissipate  its  fear ;  I  dispose 
of  it  within  the  circuit  of  my  expanding  life. 
So  much  only  of  life  as  I  know  by  experience, 
so  much  of  the  wilderness  have  I  vanquished  and 
planted,  or  so  far  have  I  extended  my  being,  my 
dominion.  I  do  not  see  how  any  man  can  afford, 
for  the  sake  of  his  nerves  and  his  nap,  to  spare 
any  action  in  \vhich  he  can  partake.  It  is  pearls 
and  rubies  to  his  discourse.  Drudgery,  calamity, 
exasperation,  want,  are  instructers  in  eloquence 
and  wisdom.  The  true  scholar  grudges  every  op 
portunity  of  action  past  by,  as  a  loss  of  power. 

It  is  the  raw  material  out  of  which  the  intellect 
moulds  her  splendid  products.  A  strange  process 


16 


too,  this,  by  which  experience  is  converted  into 
thought,  as  a  mulberry  leaf  is  converted  into  satin. 
The  manufacture  goes  forward  at  all  hours. 

The  actions  and  events  of  our  childhood  and 
youth,  are  now  matters  of  calmest  observation. 
They  lie  like  fair  pictures  in  the  air.  Not  so 
with  our  recent  actions,  —  with  the  business 
which  we  now  have  in  hand.  On  this  we  are 
quite  unable  to  speculate.  Our  affections  as  yet 
circulate  through  it.  We  no  more  feel  or  know 
it,  than  we  feel  the  feet,  or  the  hand,  or  the  brain 
of  our  body.  The  new  deed  is  yet  a  part  of 
life,  —  remains  for  a  time  immersed  in  our  un 
conscious  life.  In  some  contemplative  hour,  it 
detaches  itself  from  the  life  like  a  ripe  fruit*  to 
become  a  thought  of  the  mind.  Instantly,  it  is 
raised,  transfigured;  the  corruptible  has  put  on  in- 
corruption.  Always  now  it  is  an  object  of  beau 
ty,  however  base  its  origin  and  neighbourhood. 
Observe,  too,  the  impossibility  of  antedating  this 
act.  In  its  grub  state,  it  cannot  fly,  it  cannot 
shine,  —  it  is  a  dull  grub.  But  suddenly,  with 
out  observation,  the  selfsame  thing  unfurls  beau 
tiful  wings,  and  is  an  angel  of  wisdom.  So  is 
there  no  fact,  no  event,  in  our  private  history, 
which  shall  not,  sooner  or  later,  lose  its  adhesive, 
inert  form,  and  astonish  us  by  soaring  from  our 
body  into  the  empyrean.  Cradle  and  infancy, 
school  and  playground,  the  fear  of  boys,  and 
dogs,  and  ferules,  the  love  of  little  maids  and 
berries,  and  many  another  fact  that  once  filled 
the  whole  sky,  are  gone  already  ;  friend  and  rel- 


17 


ative,   profession   and   party,    town    and    country, 
nation  and  world,  must  also  soar  and  sing. 

Of  course,  he  who  has  put  forth  his  total 
strength  in  fit  actions,  has  the  richest  return  of 
wisdom.  I  will  not  shut  myself  out  of  this  globe 
of  action  and  transplant  an  oak  into  a  flower-pot, 
there  to  hunger  and  pine ;  nor  trust  the  revenue 
of  some  single  faculty,  and  exhaust  one  vein  of 
thought,  much  like  those  Savoyards,  who,  getting 
their  livelihood  by  carving  shepherds,  shepherd 
esses,  and  smoking  Dutchmen,  for  all  Europe, 
went  out  one  day  to  the  mountain  to  find  stock, 
and  discovered  that  they  had  whittled  up  the 
last  of  their  pine  trees.  Authors  we  have,  in 
numbers,  who  have  written  out  their  vein,  and 
who,  moved  by  a  commendable  prudence,  sail 
for  Greece  or  Palestine,  follow  the  trapper  into 
the  prairie,  or  ramble  round  Algiers  to  replenish 
their  merchantable  stock. 

If  it  were  only  for  a  vocabulary  the  scholar 
would  be  covetous  of  action.  Life  is  our  dic 
tionary.  Years  are  well  spent  in  country  labors; 
in  town,  —  in  the  insight  into  trades  and  manu 
factures;  in  frank  intercourse  with  many  men  and 
women ;  in  science ;  in  art ;  to  the  one  end  of 
mastering  in  all  their  facts  a  language  by  which 
to  illustrate  and  embody  our  perceptions.  I  learn 
immediately  from  any  speaker  how  much  he  has 
already  lived,  through  the  poverty  or  the  splen 
dor  of  his  speech.  Life  lies  behind  us  as  the 
quarry  from  whence  we  get  tiles  and  copestones 
for  the  masonry  of  to-day.  This  is  the  way  to 
3 


18 


learn  grammar.  Colleges  and  books  only  copy 
the  language  which  the  field  and  the  work-yard 
made. 

But  the  final  value  of  action,  like  that  of 
books,  and  better  than  books,  is,  that  it  is  a 
resource.  That  great  principle  of  Undulation  in 
nature,  that  shows  itself  in  the  inspiring  and  ex 
piring  of  the  breath ;  in  desire  and  satiety ;  in 
the  ebb  and  flow  of  the  sea ;  in  day  and  night ; 
in  heat  and  cold ;  and  as  yet  more  deeply  in 
grained  in  every  atom  and  every  fluid,  is  known 
to  us  under  the  name  of  Polarity,  —  these  '  fits 
of  easy  transmission  and  reflection,'  as  Newton 
called  them,  are  the  law  of  nature  because  they 
are  the  law  of  spirit. 

The  mind  now  thinks  ;  now  acts  ;  and  each 
fit  reproduces  the  other.  When  the  artist  has 
exhausted  his  materials,  when  the  fancy  no  longer 
paints,  when  thoughts  are  no  longer  apprehended, 
and  books  are  a  weariness,  —  he  has  always  the 
resource  to  live.  Character  is  higher  than  intel 
lect.  Thinking  is  the  function.  Living  is  the 
functionary.  The  stream  retreats  to  its  source. 
A  great  soul  will  be  strong  to  live,  as  well  as 
strong  to  think.  Does  he  lack  organ  or  medium 
to  impart  his  truths  ?  He  can  still  fall  back  on 
this  elemental  force  of  living  them.  This  is  a 
total  act.  Thinking  is  a  partial  act.  Let  the 
grandeur  of  justice  shine  in  his  affairs.  Let  the 
beauty  of  affection  cheer  his  lowly  roof.  Those 
'  far  from  fame',  who  dwell  and  act  with  him, 
will  feel  the  force  of  his  constitution  in  the  do- 


19 


ings  and  passages  of  the  day  better  than  it  can 
be  measured  by  any  public  and  designed  display. 
Time  shall  teach  him,  that  the  scholar  loses  no 
hour  which  the  man  lives.  Herein  he  unfolds 
the  sacred  germ  of  his  instinct,  screened  from  in 
fluence.  What  is  lost  in  seemliness  is  gained  in 
strength.  Not  out  of  those,  on  whom  systems  of 
education  have  exhausted  their  culture,  comes 
the  helpful  giant  to  destroy  the  old  or  to  build 
the  new,  but  out  of  unhandselled  savage  nature, 
out  of  terrible  Druids  and  Berserkirs,  come  at 
last  Alfred  and  Shakspeare. 

I  hear  therefore  with  joy  whatever  is  beginning 
to  be  said  of  the  dignity  and  necessity  of  labor 
to  every  citizen.  There  is  virtue  yet  in  the  hoe 
and  the  spade,  for  learned  as  well  as  for  unlearn 
ed  hands.  And  labor  is  everywhere  welcome  ; 
always  we  are  invited  to  work  ;  only  be  this 
limitation  observed,  that  a  man  shall  not  for  the 
sake  of  wider  activity  sacrifice  any  opinion  to  the 
popular  judgments  and  modes  of  action. 

I  have  now  spoken  of  the  education  of  the 
scholar  by  nature,  by  books,  and  by  action.  It 
remains  to  say  somewhat  of  his  duties. 

They  are  such  as  become  Man  Thinking.  They 
may  all  be  comprised  in  self-trust.  The  office  of 
the  scholar  is  to  cheer,  to  raise,  and  to  guide 
men  by  showing  them  facts  amidst  appearances. 
He  plies  the  slow,  unhonored,  and  unpaid  task 
of  observation.  Flamsteed  and  Herschel,  in  their 
glazed  observatories,  may  catalogue  the  stars  with 


20 


the  praise  of  all  men,  and,  the  results  being 
splendid  and  useful,  honor  is  sure.  But  he,  in 
his  private  observatory,  cataloguing  obscure  and 
nebulous  stars  of  the  human  mind,  which  as  yet 
no  man  has  thought  of  as  such,  —  watching  days 
and  months,  sometimes,  for  a  few  facts ;  correct 
ing  still  his  old  records;  —  must  relinquish  dis 
play  and  immediate  fame.  In  the  long  period 
of  his  preparation,  he  must  betray  often  an  ig 
norance  and  shiftlessness  in  popular  arts,  incur 
ring  the  disdain  of  the  able  who  shoulder  him 
aside.  Long  he  must  stammer  in  his  speech  ; 
often  forego  the  living  for  the  dead.  Worse  yet, 
he  must  accept,  —  how  often  !  poverty  and  soli 
tude.  For  the  ease  and  pleasure  of  treading  the 
old  road,  accepting  the  fashions,  the  education,  the 
religion  of  society,  he  takes  the  cross  of  making 
his  own,  and,  of  course,  the  self-accusation,  the 
faint  heart,  the  frequent  uncertainty  and  loss  of 
time,  which  are  the  nettles  and  tangling  vines  in 
the  way  of  the  self-relying  and  self-directed ;  and 
the  state  of  virtual  hostility  in  which  he  seems 
to  stand  to  society,  and  especially  to  educated  so 
ciety.  For  all  this  loss  and  scorn,  what  offset  ? 
He  is  to  find  consolation  in  exercising  the  high 
est  functions  of  human  nature.  He  is  one,  who 
raises  himself  from  private  considerations,  and 
breathes  and  lives  on  public  and  illustrious  thoughts. 
He  is  the  world's  eye.  He  is  the  world's  heart. 
He  is  to  resist  the  vulgar  prosperity  that  retro 
grades  ever  to  barbarism,  by  preserving  and  com 
municating  heroic  sentiments,  noble  biographies, 


melodious  verse,  and  the  conclusions  of  history. 
Whatsoever  oracles  the  human  heart  in  all  emer 
gencies,  in  all  solemn  hours,  has  uttered  as  its 
commentary  on  the  world  of  actions,  —  these  he 
shall  receive  and  impart.  And  whatsoever  new 
verdict  Reason  from  her  inviolable  seat  pronoun 
ces  on  the  passing  men  and  events  of  to-day,  — 
this  he  shall  hear  and  promulgate. 

These  being  his  functions,  it  becomes  him  to 
feel  all  confidence  in  himself,  and  to  defer  never 
to  the  popular  cry.  He  and  he  only  knows  the 
world.  The  world  of  any  moment  is  the  merest 
appearance.  Some  great  decorum,  some  fetish 
of  a  government,  some  ephemeral  trade,  or  war, 
or  man,  is  cried  up  by  half  mankind  and  cried 
down  by  the  other  half,  as  if  all  depended  on 
this  particular  up  or  down.  The  odds  are  that 
the  whole  question  is  not  worth  the  poorest  thought 
which  the  scholar  has  lost  in  listening  to  the  con 
troversy.  Let  him  not  quit  his  belief  that  a  pop 
gun  is  a  popgun,  though  the  ancient  and  honorable 
of  the  earth  affirm  it  to  be  the  crack  of  doom.  In 
silence,  in  steadiness,  in  severe  abstraction,  let  him 
hold  by  himself  ;  add  observation  to  observation, 
patient  of  neglect,  patient  of  reproach ;  and  bide  his 
own  time,  —  happy  enough,  if  he  can  satisfy  him 
self  alone,  that  this  day  he  has  seen  something 
truly.  Success  treads  on  every  right  step.  For 
the  instinct  is  sure,  that  prompts  him  to  tell  his 
brother  what  he  thinks.  He  then  learns,  that  in 
going  down  into  the  secrets  of  his  own  mind,  he 
has  descended  into  the  secrets  of  all  minds.  He 


22 


learns  that  he  who  has  mastered  any  law  in  his 
private  thoughts,  is  master  to  that  extent  of  all 
men  whose  language  he  speaks,  and  of  all  into 
whose  language  his  own  can  be  translated.  The 
poet,  in  utter  solitude  remembering  his  spontane 
ous  thoughts  and  recording  them,  is  found  to 
have  recorded  that,  which  men  in  '  cities  vast ' 
find  true  for  them  also.  The  orator  distrusts  at 
first  the  fitness  of  his  frank  confessions,  —  his 
want  of  knowledge  of  the  persons  he  addresses, 
—  until  he  finds  that  he  is  the  complement  of 
his  hearers ;  —  that  they  drink  his  words  because 
he  fulfils  for  them  their  own  nature ;  the  deeper 
he  dives  into  his  privatest,  secretest  presentiment, 
to  his  wonder  he  finds,  this  is  the  most  accepta 
ble,  most  public,  and  universally  true.  The  peo 
ple  delight  in  it;  the  better  part  of  every  man 
feels,  This  is  my  music ;  this  is  myself. 

In  self-trust,  all  the  virtues  are  comprehended. 
Free  should  the  scholar  be,  —  free  and  brave. 
Free  even  to  the  definition  of  freedom,  "  without 
any  hindrance  that  does  not  arise  out  of  his  own 
constitution."  Brave  ;  for  fear  is  a  thing,  which 
a  scholar  by  his  very  function  puts  behind  him. 
Fear  always  springs  from  ignorance.  It  is  a 
shame  to  him  if  his  tranquillity,  amid  dangerous 
times,  arise  from  the  presumption,  that,  like  chil 
dren  and  women,  his  is  a  protected  class ;  or  if 
he  seek  a  temporary  peace  by  the  diversion  of 
his  thoughts  from  politics  or  vexed  questions,  hid 
ing  his  head  like  an  ostrich  in  the  flowering 
bushes,  peeping  into  microscopes,  and  turning 


23 


rhymes,  as  a  boy  whistles  to  keep  his  courage 
up.  So  is  the  danger  a  danger  still ;  so  is  the 
fear  worse.  Manlike  let  him  turn  and  face  it. 
Let  him  look  into  its  eye  and  search  its  nature, 
inspect  its  origin,  —  see  the  whelping  of  this  li 
on,  —  which  lies  no  great  way  back ;  he  will  then 
find  in  himself  a  perfect  comprehension  of  its  na 
ture  and  extent ;  he  will  have  made  his  hands 
meet  on  the  other  side,  and  can  henceforth  defy 
it,  and  pass  on  superior.  The  world  is  his,  who 
can  see  through  its  pretension.  What  deafness, 
what  stone-blind  custom,  what  overgrown  error 
you  behold,  is  there  only  by  sufferance,  —  by  your 
sufferance.  See  it  to  be  a  lie,  and  you  have  al 
ready  dealt  it  its  mortal  blow. 

Yes,  we  are  the  cowed,  —  we  the  trustless. 
It  is  a  mischievous  notion  that  we  are  come  late 
into  nature ;  that  the  world  was  finished  a  long 
time  ago.  As  the  world  was  plastic  and  fluid  in 
the  hands  of  God,  so  it  is  ever  to  so  much  of  his 
attributes  as  we  bring  to  it.  To  ignorance  and 
sin,  it  is  flint.  They  adapt  themselves  to  it  as 
they  may ;  but  in  proportion  as  a  man  has  any 
thing  in  him  divine,  the  firmament  flows  before 
him  and  takes  his  signet  and  form.  Not  he  is 
great  who  can  alter  matter,  but  he  who  can  alter 
my  state  of  mind.  They  are  the  kings  of  the 
world  who  give  the  color  of  their  present  thought 
to  all  nature  and  all  art,  and  persuade  men  by 
the  cheerful  serenity  of  their  carrying  the  matter, 
that  this  thing  which  they  do,  is  the  apple  which 
the  ages  have  desired  to  pluck,  now  at  last  ripe, 


24 


and  inviting  nations  to  the  harvest.  The  great 
man  makes  the  great  thing.  Wherever  Macdon- 
ald  sits,  there  is  the  head  of  the  table.  Linnaeus 
makes  botany  the  most  alluring  of  studies  and 
wins  it  from  the  farmer  and  the  herb-woman. 
Davy,  chemistry  ;  and  Cuvier,  fossils.  The  day 
is  always  his,  who  works  in  it  with  serenity  and 
great  aims.  The  unstable  estimates  of  men  crowd 
to  him  whose  mind  is  filled  with  a  truth,  as  the 
heaped  waves  of  the  Atlantic  follow  the  moon. 
For  this  self-trust,  the  reason  is  deeper  than 
can  be  fathomed,  —  darker  than  can  be  enlighten 
ed.  I  might  not  carry  with  me  the  feeling  of 
my  audience  in  stating  my  own  belief.  But  I 
have  already  shown  the  ground  of  my  hope,  in 
adverting  to  the  doctrine  that  man  is  one.  I  be 
lieve  man  has  been  wronged  ;  he  has  wronged 
himself.  He  has  almost  lost  the  light,  that  can 
lead  him  back  to  his  prerogatives.  Men  are  be 
come  of  no  account.  Men  in  history,  men  in  the 
world  of  to-day  are  bugs,  are  spawn,  and  are 
called  '  the  mass '  and  '  the  herd.'  In  a  cen 
tury,  in  a  millenium,  one  or  two  men ;  that  is 
to  say,  —  one  or  two  approximations  to  the  right 
state  of  every  man.  All  the  rest  behold  in  the 
hero  or  the  poet  their  own  green  and  crude  being, 
—  ripened ;  yes,  and  are  content  to  be  less,  so 
that  may  attain  to  its  full  stature.  What  a  tes 
timony,  —  full  of  grandeur,  full  of  pity,  is  borne 
to  the  demands  of  his  own  nature,  by  the  poor 
clansman,  the  poor  partisan,  who  rejoices  in  the 
glory  of  his  chief.  The  poor  and  the  low  find 


25 


some  amends  to  their  immense  moral  capacity, 
for  their  acquiescence  in  a  political  and  social  in 
feriority.  They  are  content  to  be  brushed  like 
flies  from  the  path  of  a  great  person,  so  that  jus 
tice  shall  be  done  by  him  to  that  common  nature 
which  it  is  the  dearest  desire  of  all  to  see  en 
larged  and  glorified.  They  sun  themselves  in  the 
great  man's  light,  and  feel  it  to  be  their  own 
element.  They  cast  the  dignity  of  man  from 
their  downtrod  selves  upon  the  shoulders  of  a 
hero,  and  will  perish  to  add  one  drop  of  blood 
to  make  that  great  heart  beat,  those  giant  sinews 
combat  and  conquer.  He  lives  for  us,  and  we 
live  in  him. 

Men  such  as  they  are,  very  naturally  seek 
money  or  power  ;  and  power  because  it  is  as 
good  as  money,  —  the  '  spoils, '  so  called,  <  of 
office.5  And  why  not  ?  for  they  aspire  to  the 
highest,  and  this,  in  their  sleep-walking,  they 
dream  is  highest.  Wake  them,  and  they  shall 
quit  the  false  good  and  leap  to  the  true,  and 
leave  governments  to  clerks  and  desks.  This 
revolution  is  to  be  wrought  by  the  gradual  do 
mestication  of  the  idea  of  Culture.  The  main 
enterprise  of  the  world  for  splendor,  for  extent, 
is  the  upbuilding  of  a  man.  Here  are  the  ma 
terials  strown  along  the  ground.  The  private  life 
of  one  man  shall  be  a  more  illustrious  monarchy, 
—  more  formidable  to  its  enemy,  more  sweet  and 
serene  in  its  influence  to  its  friend,  than  any 
kingdom  in  history.  For  a  man,  rightly  viewed, 
comprehended!  the  particular  natures  of  all  men. 


26 


Each  philosopher,  each  bard,  each  actor,  has  only 
done  for  me,  as  by  a  delegate,  what  one  day  I 
can  do  for  myself.  The  books  which  once  we 
valued  more  than  the  apple  of  the  eye,  we  have 
quite  exhausted.  What  is  that  but  saying,  that 
we  have  come  up  with  the  point  of  view  which 
the  universal  mind  took  through  the  eyes  of  that 
one  scribe  ;  we  have  been  that  man,  and  have 
passed  on.  First,  one ;  then,  another  ;  we  drain 
all  cisterns,  and,  waxing  greater  by  all  these  sup 
plies,  we  crave  a  better  and  more  abundant  food. 
The  man  has  never  lived  that  can  feed  us  ever. 
The  human  mind  cannot  be  enshrined  in  a  person, 
who  shall  set  a  barrier  on  any  one  side  to  this 
unbounded,  unboundable  empire.  It  is  one  cen 
tral  fire,  which,  flaming  now  out  of  the  lips  of 
Etna,  lightens  the  capes  of  Sicily  ;  and,  now  out 
of  the  throat  of  Vesuvius,  illuminates  the  towers 
and  vineyards  of  Naples.  It  is  one  light  which 
beams  out  of  a  thousand  stars.  It  is  one  soul 
which  animates  all  men. 

But  I  have  dwelt  perhaps  tediously  upon  this 
abstraction  of  the  Scholar.  I  ought  not  to  de 
lay  longer  to  add  what  I  have  to  say,  of  nearer 
reference  to  the  time  and  to  this  country. 

Historically,  there  is  thought  to  be  a  difference 
in  the  ideas  which  predominate  over  successive 
epochs,  and  there  are  data  for  marking  the  genius 
of  the  Classic,  of  the  Romantic,  and  now  of  the 
Reflective  or  Philosophical  age.  With  the  views 
I  have  intimated  of  the  oneness  or  the  identity 


27 


of  the  mind  through  all  individuals,  I  do  not 
much  dwell  on  these  differences.  In  fact,  I  be 
lieve  each  individual  passes  through  all  three. 
The  boy  is  a  Greek ;  the  youth,  romantic ;  the 
adult,  reflective.  I  deny  not,  however,  that  a 
revolution  in  the  leading  idea  may  be  distinctly 
enough  traced. 

Our  age  is  bewailed  as  the  age  of  Introversion. 
Must  that  needs  be  evil  ?  We,  it  seems,  are  crit 
ical.  We  are  embarrassed  with  second  thoughts. 

o 

We  cannot  enjoy  any  thing  for  hankering  to  know 
whereof  the  pleasure  consists.  We  are  lined 
with  eyes.  We  see  with  our  feet.  The  time  is 
infected  with  Hamlet's  unhappiness, — 

"Sicklied  o'er  with  the  pale  cast  of  thought." 

Is  it  so  bad  then  ?  Sight  is  the  last  thing  to 
be  pitied.  Would  we  be  blind  ?  Do  we  fear 
lest  we  should  outsee  nature  and  God,  and  drink 
truth  dry  ?  I  look  upon  the  discontent  of  the 
literary  class,  as  a  mere  announcement  of  the  fact, 
that  they  find  themselves  not  in  the  state  of 
mind  of  their  fathers,  and  regret  the  coming 
state  as  untried  ;  as  a  boy  dreads  the  water  be 
fore  he  has  learned  that  he  can  swim.  If  there 
is  any  period  one  would  desire  to  be  born  in, 
—  is  it  not  the  age  of  Revolution ;  when  the  old 
and  the  new  stand  side  by  side,  and  admit  of 
being  compared  ;  when  the  energies  of  all  men 
are  searched  by  fear  and  by  hope  ;  when  the 
historic  glories  of  the  old,  can  be  compensated 
by  the  rich  possibilities  of  the  new  era  ?  This 


28 


time,  like  all  times,  is  a  very  good  one,  if  we 
but  know  what  to  do  with  it. 

I  read  with  joy  some  of  the  auspicious  signs 
of  the  coming  days,  as  they  glimmer  already 
through  poetry  and  art,  through  philosophy  and 
science,  through  church  and  state. 

One  of  these  signs  is  the  fact,  that  the  same 
movement  which  effected  the  elevation  of  what 
was  called  the  lowest  class  in  the  state,  assumed 
in  literature  a  very  marked  and  as  benign  an  as 
pect.  Instead  of  the  sublime  and  beautiful ;  the 
near,  the  low,  the  common,  was  explored  and 
poetized.  That,  which  had  been  negligently  trod 
den  under  foot  by  those  who  were  harnessing 
and  provisioning  themselves  for  long  journeys 
into  far  countries,  is  suddenly  found  to  be  richer 
than  all  foreign  parts.  The  literature  of  the  poor, 
the  feelings  of  the  child,  the  philosophy  of  the 
street,  the  meaning  of  household  life,  are  the 
topics  of  the  time.  It  is  a  great  stride.  It  is 
a  sign,  —  is  it  not  ?  of  new  vigor,  when  the  ex 
tremities  are  made  active,  when  currents  of  warm 
life  run  into  the  hands  and  the  feet.  I  ask  not 
for  the  great,  the  remote,  the  romantic ;  what  is 
doing  in  Italy  or  Arabia ;  what  is  Greek  art,  or 
Provencal  minstrelsy  ;  I  embrace  the  common, 
I  explore  and  sit  at  the  feet  of  the  familiar,  the 
low.  Give  me  insight  into  to-day,  and  you  may 
have  the  antique  and  future  worlds.  What 
would  we  really  know  the  meaning  of  ?  The 
meal  in  the  firkin ;  the  milk  in  the  pan  ;  the 
ballad  in  the  street ;  the  news  of  the  boat ;  the 


glance  of  the  eye ;  the  form  and  the  gait  of  the 
body ;  —  show  me  the  ultimate  reason  of  these 
matters ;  show  me  the  sublime  presence  of  the 
highest  spiritual  cause  lurking,,  as  always  it  does 
lurk,  in  these  suburbs  and  extremities  of  nature ; 
let  me  see  every  trifle  bristling  with  the  polarity 
that  ranges  it  instantly  on  an  eternal  law  ;  and 
the  shop,  the  plough,  and  the  leger,  referred  to 
the  like  cause  by  which  light  undulates  and  po 
ets  sing ;  —  and  the  world  lies  no  longer  a  dull 
miscellany  and  lumber-room,  but  has  form  and 
order ;  there  is  no  trifle ;  there  is  no  puzzle  ;  but 
one  design  unites  and  animates  the  farthest  pin 
nacle  and  the  lowest  trench. 

This  idea  has  inspired  the  genius  of  Gold 
smith,  Burns,  Cowper,  and,  in  a  newer  time,  of 
Goethe,  Wordsworth,  and  Carlyle.  This  idea 
they  have  differently  followed  and  with  various 
success.  In  contrast  with  their  writing,  the  style 
of  Pope,  of  Johnson,  of  Gibbon,  looks  cold  and 
pedantic.  This  writing  is  blood-warm.  Man  is 
surprised  to  find  that  things  near  are  not  less 
beautiful  and  wondrous  than  things  remote.  The 
near  explains  the  far.  The  drop  is  a  small 
ocean.  A  man  is  related  to  all  nature.  This 
perception  of  the  worth  of  the  vulgar  is  fruit 
ful  in  discoveries.  Goethe,  in  this  very  thing 
the  most  modem  of  the  moderns,  has  shown  us, 
as  none  ever  did,  the  genius  of  the  ancients. 

There  is  one  man  of  genius,  who  has  done 
much  for  this  philosophy  of  life,  whose  literary 
value  has  never  yet  been  rightly  estimated; — I 


30 


mean  Emanuel  Swedenborg.  The  most  imagin 
ative  of  men,  jet  writing  with  the  precision  of  a 
mathematician,  he  endeavoured  to  engraft  a  purely 
philosophical  Ethics  on  the  popular  Christianity 
of  his  time.  Such  an  attempt,  of  course,  must 
have  difficulty,  which  no  genius  could  surmount. 
But  he  saw  and  showed  the  connexion  between 
nature  and  the  affections  of  the  soul.  He  pierced 
the  emblematic  or  spiritual  character  of  the  visi 
ble,  audible,  tangible  world.  Especially  did  his 
shade-loving  muse  hover  over  and  interpret  the 
lower  parts  of  nature  ;  he  showed  the  myste 
rious  bond  that  allies  moral  evil  to  the  foul  ma 
terial  forms,  and  has  given  in  epical  parables  a 
theory  of  insanity,  of  beasts,  of  unclean  and 
fearful  things. 

Another  sign  of  our  times,  also  marked  by  an 
analogous  political  movement,  is,  the  new  impor 
tance  given  to  the  single  ,  person.  Every  thing 
that  tends  to  insulate  the  individual,  —  to  sur 
round  him  with  barriers  of  natural  respect,  so 
that  each  man  shall  feel  the  world  is  his,  and 
man  shall  treat  with  man  as  a  sovereign  state 
with  a  sovereign  state  ;  —  tends  to  true  union 
as  well  as  greatness.  "  I  learned,"  said  the 
melancholy  Pestalozzi,  "  that  no  man  in  God's 
wide  earth  is  either  willing  or  able  to  help  any 
other  man."  Help  must  come  from  the  bosom 
alone.  The  scholar  is  that  man  who  must  take 
up  into  himself  all  the  ability  of  the  time,  all 
the  contributions  of  the  past,  all  the  hopes  of 
the  future.  He  must  be  an  university  of  knowl- 


31 


edges.     If  there  be  one  lesson  more  than   anoth 
er,   which  should  pierce  his  ear,  it  is,  The  world 
is  nothing,  the  man  is  all ;  in  yourself  is  the  law 
of  all  nature,  and  you  know  not  yet  how  a   glo 
bule   of    sap   ascends ;    in   yourself   slumbers   the 
whole  of   Reason ;    it  is  for  you   to  know   all,   it 
is  for  you  to  dare  all.     Mr.  President  and   Gen 
tlemen,  this   confidence   in  the    unsearched    might 
of  man  belongs,  by  all  motives,  by  all   prophecy, 
by  all  preparation,  to  the  American  Scholar.     We 
have    listened    too    long  to  the    courtly  muses    of 
Europe.     The   spirit  of  the  American   freeman  is 
already    suspected    to   be    timid,    imitative,    tame. 
Public    and    private    avarice    make    the    air    wre 
breathe    thick    and   fat.      The    scholar   is   decent, 
indolent,    complaisant.      See    already    the    tragic 
consequence.      The  mind  of   this    country,  taught 
to  aim  at  low  objects,  eats  upon  itself.      There 
is   no   work    for   any  but   the   decorous    and    the 
complaisant.     Young  men  of  the  fairest  promise, 
who  begin    life  upon  our  shores,  inflated    by   the 
mountain    winds,   shined  upon   by  all  the   stars  of 
God,  find    the    earth   below   not    in    unison   with 
these,  —  but    are    hindered    from    action    by   the 
disgust  which  the  principles   on  which  business  is 
managed    inspire,    and    turn   drudges,    or    die    of 
disgust,  —  some    of  them    suicides.     What    is    the 
remedy  ?     They  did    not   yet  see,  and    thousands 
of  young   men    as    hopeful  now    crowding  to  the 
barriers    for    the    career,  do  not    yet   see,  that,    if 
the   single    man  plant  himself  indomitably  on  his 
instincts,   and  there    abide,  the    huge    world    will 


come  round  to  him.  Patience,  —  patience  ;  — 
with  the  shades  of  all  the  good  and  great  for 
company ;  and  for  solace,  the  perspective  of  your 
own  infinite  life ;  and  for  work,  the  study  and 
the  communication  of  principles,  the  making 
those  instincts  prevalent,  the  conversion  of  the 
world.  Is  it  not  the  chief  disgrace  in  the  world, 
not  to  be  an  unit ;  —  not  to  be  reckoned  one 
character ;  —  not  to  yield  that  peculiar  fruit  which 
each  man  was  created  to  bear,  but  to  be  reckoned 
in  the  gross,  in  the  hundred,  or  the  thousand,  of 
the  party,  the  section,  to  which  we  belong  ;  and 
our  opinion  predicted  geographically,  as  the  north, 
or  the  south.  Not  so,  brothers  and  friends,  — 
please  God,  ours  shall  not  be  so.  We  will  walk 
on  our  own  feet ;  we  will  work  with  our  own 
hands ;  we  will  speak  our  own  minds.  Then 
shall  man  be  no  longer  a  name  for  pity,  for 
doubt,  and  for  sensual  indulgence.  The  dread 
of  man  and  the  love  of  man  shall  be  a  wall  of 
defence  and  a  wreath  of  joy  around  all.  A  na 
tion  of  men  will  for  the  first  time  exist,  because 
each  believes  himself  inspired  by  the  Divine  Soul 
which  also  inspires  all  men. 


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